


anatomy of the heart

by sporklift



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Character Study, Gay Will Byers, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Pining, Second person POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-20
Updated: 2017-11-20
Packaged: 2019-02-04 14:15:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12772800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sporklift/pseuds/sporklift
Summary: It's an inevitable tragedy, that Will Byers fell in love with Mike Wheeler.





	anatomy of the heart

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to experiment with second person POV, and this is what happened. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

You haven’t been paying attention. If you had been, you would’ve known - a long time ago - that you don’t have a prayer.  That he doesn’t look at you like Lucas looks at Max. Or how Jonathan looks at Nancy. He doesn’t look at you like Hopper looks at Mom. He doesn’t look at you like he looks at El.

He looks at you like he’s always looked at you, and if you pay attention, you can see that maybe it’s different than how he looks at Lucas and at Dustin and at Max, but it’s not the _same._

So, you don’t pay attention. You pretend that difference - the second longer his eyes meet yours and the way his lip flicks up, soft, means exactly what you want it to, and you say, “Mike,” like it’s the most important word in your vocabulary, and you stop paying attention long enough to forget that he says, “Will,” like he’s always said it.

 

(He says, “Will,” and you’re turning to goo even though he’s just asking for the Algebra notes from when he was sick the other day.)

 

You were fourteen when you first realized you loved him. At first, you didn’t really get it. It just seemed like grumpiness. A little bit of coldness. When El had Mike and Lucas had Max and the only single guys in the party were you and Dustin. And Dustin wasn’t exactly a-okay with it at first, either.

But, the thing is, Dustin got over it. Dustin moved on.

And you couldn’t help but wonder what, exactly, was different about you. Maybe it was something leftover from all that stupid trauma. Maybe this was the Mind Flayer’s last parting gift.

Hell if you knew why. You didn't know why.

Until you did. And you held that realization close to your chest for a few good weeks until you were home, sour, because all the guys had dates (all of them: Dustin included) one Friday night to see this new _Back to the Future_ movie and you didn’t. And even though you didn’t tell Mom that it’s Mike, she held you tight and told you everything was gonna be okay when you finally tell her the reason you didn't have a date is because you only want to date other boys.

You told Jonathan two days later, and he clasped your shoulder and reminded you how overrated normal is. His heart was in the right place, but you couldn’t help but notice the implication: for this, you’re abnormal. But you hugged your brother anyway and you jammed with him, because he didn't know how to handle this any better than you did.

 

He still doesn't; and neither do you. 

 

You waited till you were sixteen to tell your friends. You didn’t know what you were expecting, but nobody slams the proverbial door in your face. Mike sat up straighter and lurked in the opposite end of the room, a gazillion miles away, and it made you want to vomit. Dustin nodded slowly and Lucas said, “Oh,” and Eleven echoed the newish word softly, like a question (“Gay?”) and didn’t seem to get why it was a big deal. Max, for her part, raised one brow and, arms across her chest, said, “Wait, you weren’t already out yet?”

(And, you’d said, “How did you know?”

And she only replied with, “I have eyes.”)

In other words, she’s been paying attention.

 

Even after all that they’ve gone through, after all the otherworldly horror, she’s paid attention enough to know that you like boys. Maybe even before you did.

So now. Now _you_ pay attention. You watch carefully. You watch Mike’s fingertips hover over your drawing and try not to flinch when he smudges the charcoal. You’ve paid enough attention over the years to notice how Mike’s face has sharpened, the bones are clearer, his freckles less pronounced. Puberty hit him like a semi-truck, and he’s six-foot-something standing now but he’s still Mike and he still smiles at the bust sketch you’re showing him, and it’s almost worth the smudges he’s leaving there. You might not be able to put it in your portfolio for art school anymore, because of the smudges, but Mike’s smiling at it and that’s what Mike does: he smudges the lines in your life and he smiles and then you melt and try to pay more attention in the future.

“It’s so good, Will,” He says. “This might be the best thing you’ve ever drawn.”

“Really?” And you’re blushing, you’re blushing and it’s definitely not from the idea of his fingerprints all over this part of you.

“For sure,” Mike grins. His teeth are a little crooked and that’s old news but you’ve never noticed how well it fits his mouth before. “Art schools are gonna fight over who gets you. And I get to say I knew you before you were Da Vinci, or whoever.”

In that moment, you want to kiss him so much it hurts. You're skewered right through the heart, there in your bedroom.

 

You have to pay more attention just because you cannot - for the life of yourself - fathom why on earth he does stuff like this. Because - doesn’t he know, too?

 

He has to know. Mike’s smart. He’s great at noticing details. He has to notice what he does to you.

 

But -- if he does notice -- why does he keep _doing it?_

 

And that’s what you’re trying to notice. But all it ends up doing is making you blush and your stomach leap even when Mike has his arm wrapped around El and you feel like the world’s biggest idiot.

 

It’s not that Mike doesn’t love you. You know he does. But he loves you like you love Dustin and Lucas and Max and El.

That almost makes it worse.

Sure - it’s selfish - but you kind of want to be in a category all your own with him. Not exactly like he is with you - because you can’t ask _that_ of him - but different. He can’t love you like you want him to, but why can’t he just…

Love you in a different way than he already does?

 

It’s stupid. Why is this the hangup that you just can’t get over? In this life of infinite universes and demogorgons and Mind Flayers and who even knows what else, why is it that this one boy - whom you’ve known forever and a day - is the one who can break you with a smile and a compliment?

 

Is it that you haven’t been paying attention -- or is it that he is just a puzzle that you’ll never be able to solve? Not everybody can be as easy to read as you, after all. Maybe you just need to give it time. Time to get over your first friend from Kindergarten, and the way he makes your heart crack in two.

 


End file.
